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Thu, 13 Dec 2018 19:44:28 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.9.7Horizontal Integration – The Direct Path to Digital Successhttps://www.ssaandco.com/horizontal-integration-the-direct-path-to-digital-success/
https://www.ssaandco.com/horizontal-integration-the-direct-path-to-digital-success/#respondThu, 13 Dec 2018 19:42:46 +0000https://www.ssaandco.com/?p=8928Three Tips for Incorporating Digital Holistically Across Your Business When tackling digital transformation, many CEOs chose to structure their digital teams as separate entities. They believed that approach would be less disruptive to their core businesses and will be easier and faster to get off the ground. However, we now know that adding digital vertically limits its benefits. Though there are short term gains to building or buying a separate digital arm to your organization, integrating digital across your business can leverage valuable existing company assets in ways that a separate unit cannot. And aligning digital closely with a firm’s other capabilities fosters the internal speed and agility critical to meeting the “anytime, anyplace” expectations of today’s digital marketplace. Nike is a prime example of a company that has transformed itself by weaving digital organically through its enterprise to strengthen…

Three Tips for Incorporating Digital Holistically Across Your Business

When tackling digital transformation, many CEOs chose to structure their digital teams as separate entities. They believed that approach would be less disruptive to their core businesses and will be easier and faster to get off the ground. However, we now know that adding digital vertically limits its benefits. Though there are short term gains to building or buying a separate digital arm to your organization, integrating digital across your business can leverage valuable existing company assets in ways that a separate unit cannot. And aligning digital closely with a firm’s other capabilities fosters the internal speed and agility critical to meeting the “anytime, anyplace” expectations of today’s digital marketplace.

Nike is a prime example of a company that has transformed itself by weaving digital organically through its enterprise to strengthen customer engagement and drive sales. The business has long recognized the need to focus resources on digital initiatives, establishing a direct-to-consumer division that oversees both in-store and online activities. The division added a dedicated e-commerce group, which has worked to strengthen and expand Nike’s digital expertise, drive greater online sales, and maximize synergies across the Nike organization.

Three Tips on Integrating Digital Holistically Across your Business:

Embrace a Shared Growth Agenda: A common shared digital agenda can help companies do whatever they do better, faster, and cheaper. Holistic integration helps the company’s divisions and functions move together. Marc Lore, now CEO of Walmart eCommerce, sold his company Jet.com to Walmart CEO Doug McMillon after being offered the compelling directive from McMillon to “take the best of both worlds and drive this thing forward.” And as Lore seeks to combine all of Walmart’s assets under one eCommerce roof, his driving mission is the belief that this new partnership will help both companies build their business. “Our shared outlook on where we are going can get us there faster than we could get there on our own.”

Rethink Your Customer Journey: Today’s customers expect personalized, streamlined experiences and value from every interaction with your brand. Those companies with the best success are prioritizing the development of an omnichannel customer journey; fusing physical and digital capabilities into one easy, consistent, and seamless customer experience for clients. Cosmetics retailer Sephora recognized early on that it needed to think digitally. It hired a CDO, moved its digital infrastructure inhouse, and aligned its digital and traditional teams via incentives and digital partnerships. Investing in a robust CRM system allowed teams to better understand and respond to customers’ needs. It also created touchscreens in store to help customers’ search for the right product, gathering valuable ecommerce data at the same time.

Develop a Common Business Language: In order to integrate digital effectively into all aspects of a company’s plan, businesses need to move away from the tech speak mindset that so often dominates the discussion of technological change. A key finding in a recent Sloan/MIT research study among business professionals was the belief that leading a digital company does not require technologists at the helm. In fact, forcing that learning curve risks disempowering and frustrating the brilliant minds needed to interpret the results, and harness the business benefits of the technology. At CVS, the health care company that has topped Fast Company’s list of the most innovative organizations in the world, digital leaders are not hired based on technological expertise. Their main attributes are the ability to inspire, manage complexity, and develop flexible cultures that are conducive to success in rapidly changing environments. Adobe’s senior management team, seeing the importance of aligning employees cross-functionally with each other and with their customers, created their Experience-a-thon program. Designed to put employees in their customers’ shoes and spur change, the program turns employees into product users, who provide immediate feedback to Adobe and other units within the company.

Digitally savvy companies think strategically about each piece of the customer experience. They develop innovative components and blend them into a holistic system that enhances competitive advantage and accelerates growth. While these three steps make digitization sound easy, integrating digital across the value chain can be challenging. It requires new operating models and capabilities. Companies must build agile cultures that fail fast and learn often. In today’s ever-changing climate, as imparted by Walmart’s Lore “you can’t get married to decisions… You have to be open and constantly rethinking things.”

]]>https://www.ssaandco.com/horizontal-integration-the-direct-path-to-digital-success/feed/0SSA & Company Notebook | Fall 2018https://www.ssaandco.com/ssa-company-notebook-fall-2018/
https://www.ssaandco.com/ssa-company-notebook-fall-2018/#respondWed, 28 Nov 2018 20:24:29 +0000https://www.ssaandco.com/?p=8921A note from our President: As we head toward the new year, we are excited to share some evolutions at SSA & Company. We recently had the pleasure of welcoming Matt Katz, Managing Partner, to our team. He brings over 25 years of global management and advisory experience working with some of the most iconic brands. Matt will grow and lead the firm’s retail and consumer packaged goods practice, as well as help manage the firm. Additionally, as we partner with clients to build next-generation businesses, we’re building a new website that better reflects impact for clients, culture, and team. We look forward to sharing it with you in the coming months. With transformation in mind, this Notebook explores how companies are reimagining business with disruptive technologies, creative and customer-centric strategies, and new digital capabilities. We delve into talent and culture changes…

As we head toward the new year, we are excited to share some evolutions at SSA & Company. We recently had the pleasure of welcoming Matt Katz, Managing Partner, to our team. He brings over 25 years of global management and advisory experience working with some of the most iconic brands. Matt will grow and lead the firm’s retail and consumer packaged goods practice, as well as help manage the firm. Additionally, as we partner with clients to build next-generation businesses, we’re building a new website that better reflects impact for clients, culture, and team. We look forward to sharing it with you in the coming months.

With transformation in mind, this Notebook explores how companies are reimagining business with disruptive technologies, creative and customer-centric strategies, and new digital capabilities. We delve into talent and culture changes required to remain competitive. We also included an interesting piece on CEO activism, shared by our sister firm TMG.

– David Niles

Ideas That Made Us Think

Target Hits the Mark with Its Integrated Digital Strategy That Places Stores at the Core

Target isn’t trying to be Amazon. Instead, Target placed its stores at the heart of its digital transformation strategy, “creating a more inspiring and connected shopping experience,” says CEO Brian Cornell. Over the past four years, Target’s digital revenues grew by over 25% year-over-year and its physical stores fulfill over half of its total digital volume. Building flexibility into its stores allows Target to meet digital demand profitably. Last Cyber Monday, Target stores shipped millions of orders, capacity that would otherwise require investment in new fulfillment centers. Target enables this strategy through a new operating model for its supply chain, using predictive methods to understand demand needs and managing inventories to lower point to point shipping costs. Target lives “digital as a horizontal” with its operating model to win by improving customer experience.

Companies Need to Reimagine KPIs to Effectively Drive Business

A new study from MIT Sloan Management and Google reveals that for many companies, KPIs are mismanaged and undervalued. What’s more, nearly 30% of business leaders don’t even use KPIs to drive change in their organizations. So how can companies make KPIs great again? For one, focus on the customer journey. Additionally, use KPIs as data inputs for predictive analytics and automation, not just report outputs to feed human decision-making. We see KPIs and their measures as building blocks to AI-driven operational improvements, where the system recommends actions to take and predicts the impact of those actions. We’re partnering with our clients to take this next step and digitize their management control reporting, ensuring KPIs effectively drive business performance.

AI & Automation Success Demands Next-Generation Talent Strategies

AI and automation are no longer a thought of the future. They are a current business force. The tools can offer efficiencies and create new work that could not be done before. Farmers Insurance uses AI-powered image recognition and automation to speed up the claims process. Energy companies use AI and automation to reinvent oil rig work. Merck’s Germany operations uses AI for predictive supply chain recommendations, such as when to adjust product supply or demand forecasts. With these new technologies, companies will need new strategies that reimagine talent and reskill employees. Companies must address culture and build agility in job design. For example, Merck plans to retrain its supply planners to become supply chain architects or supply chain data scientists.

The Future of Finance is Quickly Growing and Legacy Firms Must Build New Capabilities

FinTech firms, including Betterment are going after every part of the financial services industry—wealth management, retail banking, lending, and payments. These companies leverage data analytics, AI, and digital tools to transform their business models into truly customer-centric ones. Betterment chief executive Jon Stein says it took a full year to capture the first $10 million in assets; today, Betterment grabs that much daily. As of September 2018, total assets under management are $15.5 billion, spread over 400,000 accounts. Fiserv, a long-time provider of software services for the industry, has demonstrated its ability to continuously adapt, with 12,000 clients with 85 million online banking end users. Charles Schwab, Vanguard, Goldman Sachs, and J.P. Morgan are just a few of the companies leaning in to fully adopting some of these new capabilities. As insurgents take share, legacy financial services institutions that are slow to adapt may fall behind.

How Shell is Applying Digital Across its Enterprise to Transform its Business

Shell has partnered with Microsoft to implement AI, cloud computing, and IoT globally. Analytics predict when equipment needs updating. Behavior analysis of gas station customers through video cameras and AI tools improve safety. AI and machine learning improve how Shell drills horizontal wells. Overall, the company is using data and digital tools to make operations safer, boost efficiency, reduce costs, and even improve communication for its global employees. Digital has the potential to drive improvements across your entire value chain. Shell offers a great reminder of that potential. But transformation will not result from chasing every new advancement. Companies must build capability to rapidly identify, pilot, prioritize, and scale emerging technologies into their business.

The Double-Edged Sword of CEO Activism
In this forward thinking piece, TMG and Stanford explore the implications of CEO activism, delving into all thing’s CEO activism—the prevalence, the range of advocacy positions taken, and the public’s reaction.

]]>https://www.ssaandco.com/ssa-company-notebook-fall-2018/feed/0Don’t Forget the Basics While Chasing the Changing Retail Marketplacehttps://www.ssaandco.com/dont-forget-the-basics-while-chasing-the-changing-retail-marketplace/
https://www.ssaandco.com/dont-forget-the-basics-while-chasing-the-changing-retail-marketplace/#respondFri, 16 Nov 2018 22:24:37 +0000https://www.ssaandco.com/?p=8918In October 2018, I had the pleasure of joining a panel with Michael Kollender, Rick Perkal, and Colin Watts at the Association for Corporate Growth’s M&A East event in Philadelphia. We had a practical and engaging discussion on “The Changing Retail Industry and the Impact of Amazon.” Our discussion revealed that while the new retail landscape presents challenges and Amazon has forced many to rethink their operating models, some have simply taken their eyes off fundamentals. Below are a few ideas that emerged from our conversation. 1. Develop “outside-in” leaders who win in the business of today and tomorrow. CEOs and leadership teams must be able to recognize and act upon the trends that have potential to improve their business. The ever-increasing pace of disruption demands that organizations build a method to constantly identify disruption while evaluating ROI and required capabilities to apply them. Yet,…

In October 2018, I had the pleasure of joining a panel with Michael Kollender, Rick Perkal, and Colin Watts at the Association for Corporate Growth’s M&A East event in Philadelphia. We had a practical and engaging discussion on “The Changing Retail Industry and the Impact of Amazon.” Our discussion revealed that while the new retail landscape presents challenges and Amazon has forced many to rethink their operating models, some have simply taken their eyes off fundamentals. Below are a few ideas that emerged from our conversation.

1. Develop “outside-in” leaders who win in the business of today and tomorrow.

CEOs and leadership teams must be able to recognize and act upon the trends that have potential to improve their business. The ever-increasing pace of disruption demands that organizations build a method to constantly identify disruption while evaluating ROI and required capabilities to apply them. Yet, CEOs must not only focus on the business of tomorrow.

Fears of obsolescence often drive boards to overly focus on “the next big thing.” However, CEOs must also win in the business of today. Retailers need to assess the dichotomy of the “business of today” (e.g., optimized store ops, inventory) with the “business of tomorrow” (e.g., digital DTC models).

2. Know Your Customer.

Do not lose sight of the most critical questions for any business. Who is our customer and what unique value do we provide them? There are 1 Billion people over 55 who control 70% of the disposable income. Marketing dollars are not proportionately focused on this demographic. Are you sure you know what they want, how they want to shop, and what they expect? Before you finalize your channel strategy, make sure youknow your customer, what’s important to them, and the ways they like to shop and engage.

While growing e-commerce or funding omnichannel initiatives are atop most Executive Agendas, funding this growth by harshly cutting costs in existing channels is fool’s gold. Most simply cannot grow digital revenue fast enough to offset new digital cost structures and shrinking top line in your heritage business to make the math work. Companies have tried to fund growth objectives by reducing store labor costs (with rising rates, this typically means less people), cutting store level inventory, or moving marketing dollars to digital campaigns. Instead of bolting on capabilities, companies need to rethink and focus on integrating business and operating models that connect the digital and physical strategies, not eliminating capabilities to fund growth.

]]>https://www.ssaandco.com/dont-forget-the-basics-while-chasing-the-changing-retail-marketplace/feed/0Matt Katz featured on panel exploring The Changing Retail Industry and the Impact of Amazon at the ACG Philadelphia M&A East Eventhttps://www.ssaandco.com/matt-katz-featured-on-panel-exploring-the-changing-retail-industry-and-the-impact-of-amazon-at-the-acg-philadelphia-ma-east-event/
https://www.ssaandco.com/matt-katz-featured-on-panel-exploring-the-changing-retail-industry-and-the-impact-of-amazon-at-the-acg-philadelphia-ma-east-event/#respondFri, 16 Nov 2018 20:32:41 +0000https://www.ssaandco.com/?p=8913In October 2018, SSA & Company Managing Partner Matt Katz participated on a panel at the ACG Philadelphia M&A East event. The discussion explored the changing retail industry and the impact Amazon has had on the industry. ACG Philadelphia has shared key takeaways from the conversation, which includes some of Matt’s insights. Matt Katz serves as Managing Partner of the Retail and Consumer Packaged Goods practice at SSA & Company.

In October 2018, SSA & Company Managing Partner Matt Katz participated on a panel at the ACG Philadelphia M&A East event. The discussion explored the changing retail industry and the impact Amazon has had on the industry. ACG Philadelphia has shared key takeaways from the conversation, which includes some of Matt’s insights. Matt Katz serves as Managing Partner of the Retail and Consumer Packaged Goods practice at SSA & Company.

]]>https://www.ssaandco.com/matt-katz-featured-on-panel-exploring-the-changing-retail-industry-and-the-impact-of-amazon-at-the-acg-philadelphia-ma-east-event/feed/0SSA & Company Notebook | Summer 2018https://www.ssaandco.com/ssa-company-notebook-summer-2018/
https://www.ssaandco.com/ssa-company-notebook-summer-2018/#respondThu, 26 Jul 2018 22:27:42 +0000https://www.ssaandco.com/?p=8823A note from our President: As Chairman of the Columbia University Deming Center Advisory Board, I recently attended the annual Deming Forum. The discussion centered around today’s unprecedented disruption and the need for clear processes around keeping an organization and its people ahead of the curve. Innovation is not a “nice to have.” It demands a delicate balance of strategy and agility. In this issue, we hear from Deb Henretta, G100 Companies Partner and former Group President of e-Business at Procter & Gamble, on how companies can win in digital and what senior leaders need to know to transform their businesses. We also explore the implications of disruptive technology on operations in retail and financial services and delve into the workforce of the future. We close with insights on human capital, shared by our sister firm The Miles Group (TMG).…

As Chairman of the Columbia University Deming Center Advisory Board, I recently attended the annual Deming Forum. The discussion centered around today’s unprecedented disruption and the need for clear processes around keeping an organization and its people ahead of the curve. Innovation is not a “nice to have.” It demands a delicate balance of strategy and agility.

In this issue, we hear from Deb Henretta, G100 Companies Partner and former Group President of e-Business at Procter & Gamble, on how companies can win in digital and what senior leaders need to know to transform their businesses. We also explore the implications of disruptive technology on operations in retail and financial services and delve into the workforce of the future. We close with insights on human capital, shared by our sister firm The Miles Group (TMG).

– David Niles, President of SSA & Company and G100 Companies

Ideas That Made Us Think

Fast Fashion Retailers Using Technology to Try to Win Back Customers

In the battle for profitability, several well-known consumer brands are adopting AI to combat losing market share. With shares down 56% in the last three years, H&M is revamping its strategy and abandoning its long-standing practice of stocking similar merchandise in stores worldwide. The company is now using advanced data to customize what it sells in individual stores. Facing competition from startups like Boohoo.com and Missguided, who have greater agility to adapt to changing trends and churn out clothing quickly, Zara enlisted Intel and Fetch Robotics to help it shift gears towards faster fashion. Meanwhile, retailers like ALDO have brought on Celect to predict customer demand in real time, allowing them to optimize inventory by store and improve online order fulfillment. While both H&M and Zara have implemented new data strategies to weather the rapidly changing retail landscape, they also serve as a cautionary tale: even disruptors eventually get disrupted. Companies must continuously seek ways to move fast, pilot innovation, and enable a culture of risk-taking. Those who succumb to inertia will soon scramble to stay relevant.

“Platformification” Trend in Financial Services Requires New and More Agile Operating Models

Fintech continues to transform banking, which is steadily evolving into a platform business. Finding ways to capture idle money has become more important than ever. Numerous digital-only banks now partner with Betterment, an online investment company. Micro investing app Acorn rolled out a debit card, Spend, and opened up 50,000 checking accounts in two days. However, a recent survey found customers are more likely to select a digital investment option from their primary bank; the top reason for doing so is ease of transferring money between accounts. Several institutions have already responded. Fidelity joined forces with Fifth Third Bancorp to offer automated advice. Chase opened Finn, a digital bank for millennials. Goldman Sachs acquired numerous fintech firms. While the switching costs for customers positions legacy companies to take advantage of the ‘platformication’ trend, they face the challenge of running parallel operating models to serve two distinct audiences. Those who best serve increasingly-digital consumers and find the nexus with traditional customers will thrive in the digital age.

In Amazon’s Blended Workforce, Machines Help People Work Faster and Smarter

Amazon continues to model how a blended workforce enables companies to remain agile and productive on a massive scale. While it has long used robots to move merchandise in its warehouses, Amazon’s executives now rely on technology to make critical buying decisions previously handled by humans. Its algorithms, refined through years of monitoring customer behavior, take the company out of the guessing game, allowing Amazon to tweak its offerings quickly and efficiently and freeing workers to focus on other areas. Joel Sutherland, supply chain professor at University of San Diego, says, “Nobody else has the resources and expertise to pull all of these emerging technologies together to remove humans from the process as much as possible, while making things more reliable and accurate.” Leading companies today recognize that decision-making must triangulate numerous inputs. Increasingly, artificial intelligence and machine learning will become key inputs. Companies that embrace a blended workforce and build an operating model around it best position themselves for success.

A CEO’s Winning Formula: Integrating Digital and Navigating Its Disruptions

As CEOs and senior executives continue to push for digital transformation, understanding where to start and how to drive success can be daunting. Deb Henretta has written a series of articles on how to thrive during this challenging process. She stresses that winning in digital does not come from slowly tweaking the margins of your business but rather to approach the transformation more holistically. CEOs must build smart strategies and business plans that weave digital into the very fabric of their business models and organizations. Moving those plans forward starts with people and enrolling CHROs in the effort can help speed up digital transformation across the enterprise. Additionally, digital transformation and enterprise transformation should not be seen as two separate initiatives. To win in our increasingly digital world, companies must bring the outside in, get the inside out, and build the right culture and capabilities. Deb and SSA & Company started a series on digital transformation, #Run2Digital, on LinkedIn. We invite you to join the conversation by following #Run2Digital and sharing your thoughts and ideas.

]]>https://www.ssaandco.com/ssa-company-notebook-summer-2018/feed/08 Tips for CEOs Leading Digital Transformationhttps://www.ssaandco.com/8-tips-for-ceos-leading-digital-transformation/
https://www.ssaandco.com/8-tips-for-ceos-leading-digital-transformation/#respondWed, 18 Jul 2018 23:51:58 +0000https://www.ssaandco.com/?p=8812Truly embracing digital is not an evolutionary change—it is revolutionary change and touches every aspect of the business. As such, it must start with CEOs and the board. It can neither be delegated, nor can it be implemented without fundamental changes to people, processes, and technologies. In partnership with SSA & Company and based on our work implementing digital strategies in the trenches alongside CEOs, boards, and their teams, I have compiled several key takeaways for CEOs to consider as they cut through complexity and successfully transform their enterprises for the digital world. 1. Ask Big Questions. How can our company use digital to do what our company does best better, faster and cheaper? How can digital tools, technologies, and capabilities help our company meet or exceed its business and organization goals? How can digital get our company to its…

Truly embracing digital is not an evolutionary change—it is revolutionary change and touches every aspect of the business. As such, it must start with CEOs and the board. It can neither be delegated, nor can it be implemented without fundamental changes to people, processes, and technologies.

In partnership with SSA & Company and based on our work implementing digital strategies in the trenches alongside CEOs, boards, and their teams, I have compiled several key takeaways for CEOs to consider as they cut through complexity and successfully transform their enterprises for the digital world.

1. Ask Big Questions. How can our company use digital to do what our company does best better, faster and cheaper? How can digital tools, technologies, and capabilities help our company meet or exceed its business and organization goals? How can digital get our company to its current goals? How can we use digital to do what my company does best, better, and faster? How can digital help improve the lives of the consumers we serve? What would happen if my supply chain took a day, instead of a month? How can we use digital to improve the customer experience or service? What if I knew which of my investments were paying off sooner? Ben Horowitz, of venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, is fond of telling managers to think about how they would they disrupt their own business—and if they have a great idea, implement it—or better yet come to him for funding.

2. Know Your Digital Starting Point. Many companies don’t know where to start and therefore end up doing nothing or starting in the wrong place. CEOs must understand how their starting place stacks up to competition and focus on best-in-class competition, not industry averages. Averages get you to the middle and that is not where you should strive to be. CEOs must understand where the digital opportunities lie in terms of overall strategy, and how to allocate resources for the best ROI. But more than anything, it’s important to stop talking and start doing. Even small, targeted projects generate momentum, break down resistance, and create “shiny objects” that generate more demand for change. You want a thoughtful approach—but don’t let that be an excuse for a deer-in-the-headlights reality.

3. Aim High. These days, it’s go big or go home. Digital is an investment for the present and future. CEOs must hold the company accountable for driving results and ROI for digital efforts; for many industries, digital is truly an existential threat or once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Remember, change today is not the incremental 10-20% we expected in the past—it’s exponential.

4. Capture the Hearts and Minds of Consumers. Change and digital transformation are occurring at an exponential pace. We need to review, rethink, and reimagine the consumer journey, which is increasingly a digital journey. Our R&D, marketing, sales, and operations teams must broaden their view and definition of the consumer path to purchase, which is increasingly an omni-channel journey that moves in and out of digital and physical worlds. We must ask ourselves: how we can we use digital to reach our target consumers and customers where they are today, and learn/experiment with how to reach them where they will be tomorrow? We must understand how to digitally engage with consumers in ways that are helpful but also respect their privacy and protect their personal information. These considerations need to work their way into and inform our business vision and forward-looking strategies and actions plans.

5. Prioritize and Measure. Digital transformation does not mean forgetting the axiomatic objectives of ROI, profitability, and growth. CEOs must study the external landscape and assess their companies’ digital capabilities and opportunities to prioritize specific initiatives based on returns, feasibility, and long-term strategic impact. Furthermore, digital projects must have clear, measurable impact to your customers, cost structure, and team.

6. Unlock the Value of Data. Big data and advanced analytics are the heart of digital transformation. Yet, many businesses have only scratched the surface in converting analytics insights into data-driven decisions that drive value. Build capabilities that enable business users to find and use the information they need to make the right decisions and take the right actions. Your leaders should be able to explain not only what happened but why.

7. Use Technology Wisely. Technology is a means to an end, not an end unto itself. Understand your priorities first then employ the tools you need to execute against them—not vice-versa. Today’s open source technologies do not require the same high upfront expenditures or the long implementation times of yesterday’s ERPs. Lastly, don’t make perfect the enemy of the good. You can make plenty of headway even if your current technology infrastructure is not fully modernized.

8. Address Capabilities and Culture. This point cannot be overstated: people and culture determine the success or failure of your digital transformation. Build your digital capital strategy into your plan from the start and continuously evolve it. Digital will only deliver value if you have the right people, in the right place, with the right data, tools, processes, and behaviors to change decision making and operate in new ways.

Digital represents one of the CEOs biggest opportunities and challenges of our time. CEOs must build smart strategies and business plans that weave digital into the very fabric of their business models and organizations. Digital has permeated all walks of life, impacting both businesses and their current and future consumers. CEOs and their C-suite leaders cannot afford to sit back and slowly adjust to these changes. They must get out in front and lead their business towards this increasingly digital future, defining new ways to use technology to improve the lives of the consumers they serve.

]]>https://www.ssaandco.com/8-tips-for-ceos-leading-digital-transformation/feed/0Accelerating Digital Transformation: 5 Ways CHROs can Helphttps://www.ssaandco.com/accelerating-digital-transformation-5-ways-chros-can-help/
https://www.ssaandco.com/accelerating-digital-transformation-5-ways-chros-can-help/#respondMon, 14 May 2018 20:24:10 +0000https://www.ssaandco.com/?p=8761How can CHROs help speed up digital transformation across the enterprise? That was a key question at a recent G100 Talent Consortium seminar. Author Ram Charan and Pat Wadors, Chief Talent Officer at ServiceNow, led a conversation with CHROs, which helped unlock actionable insights. The ensuing conversation led us to five key ideas—and no surprise, it all starts with people. 1. Create a culture that embraces agility and operates at the speed of data. Think like a startup. HR managers must instill a growth mindset and facilitate continuous discussion about disruption and agility. Does your company’s senior team prize speed, agility, and continuous innovation? Change management used to be a deliberate plan with a long runway. That approach is no longer relevant in the fast-moving world. Off-sites and town halls alone are no longer an effective way to communicate strategy.…

How can CHROs help speed up digital transformation across the enterprise? That was a key question at a recent G100 Talent Consortium seminar. Author Ram Charan and Pat Wadors, Chief Talent Officer at ServiceNow, led a conversation with CHROs, which helped unlock actionable insights. The ensuing conversation led us to five key ideas—and no surprise, it all starts with people.

1. Create a culture that embraces agility and operates at the speed of data. Think like a startup. HR managers must instill a growth mindset and facilitate continuous discussion about disruption and agility. Does your company’s senior team prize speed, agility, and continuous innovation? Change management used to be a deliberate plan with a long runway. That approach is no longer relevant in the fast-moving world. Off-sites and town halls alone are no longer an effective way to communicate strategy. Digital tools can enhance the execution of change management practices. Leading companies use digital engagement platforms to drive speed and transparency of strategy communication—creating real dialogue and engagement at all levels. Additionally, advanced analytics tools like Natural Language Processing can help companies gain predictive insights to drive change adoption—allowing for real-time understanding of what’s working and what’s not. Legacy organizations must build capability to operate at the speed of data—which is at lightning speed— in order to stay on top of changing habits, attitudes, and preferences of their consumers and customers.

2. Transform Core Functions. Core functions provide critical support to the organization and work process. Leaders of core functions must rethink their role in the increasing digital world we live and work in. Traditional roles of marketing, finance, and strategy can pose obstacles to digitization in many companies. These functions must evolve in lock step with the business units in order for the whole enterprise to transform. Digital transformation starts with finding or building more data-savvy talent—leaders who can comfortably make the move to data-based decision making. That doesn’t mean everyone needs to know how to build algorithms. Rather, leaders must understand how to use them and glean predictive insights from them. Are your core functional leaders up to the challenge? Do your core function heads regularly partner and interact with your CIO/CDO to create best-in-class data-based strategies and work processes?

3. Build capability to enhance the customer journey. How can your business reach consumers in less time and use digitization to personalize each customer’s experience but do so in ways that secures user privacy and protects user personal data? Start by mapping the end-to-end consumer experience to begin measuring the quality and quantity of touchpoints. Many airlines, for example, have 65 consumer touchpoints. Are there more direct ways to reach and understand consumers based on where your business falls in the value chain? CHROs must recruit AI talent and embed them into product and service teams to bring a data-driven approach to building customer experiences. They must also create and incentivize cross-functional teams to improve end-to-end customer experiences while ensuring the utmost privacy and care of customer information.

4. Double down on digital upskilling. Legacy companies often require digital capability leaps to deliver on their transformation strategy. Is your company truly data-driven? How well does your organization understand new technologies (e.g., AI, IoT) and existing tools (e.g., CRM)? How does your organization keep up with emerging data technologies and incorporate them into your work and tech systems? Does your organization have the capability to design digital customer experiences or capitalize on data and digital experiences to build new business models? Map digital skills to your organization’s goals to understand the required capabilities your business needs to succeed. Then, allocate two years’ worth of development dollars for immersive training.

5. Enhance employee experience through digital. Established companies can bring people along the digital journey by building modern work experiences. The rise of cross-functional workflows, however, make this difficult. Take onboarding, often a friction-laid process where employees navigate IT, finance, compliance, and security. What if software collected data on all important moments and nurtured an employee’s journey, from recruit to alumnus, with predictive training and development? Find process designers who can map all employee touchpoints across silos and functions, a crucial data collection exercise lacking in most big companies. Then, design experiences that place talent at the center and reinforce company principles.

Digital disruption and the ever-changing business landscape have significantly changed the C-suite’s directive. While all executives must understand how to embrace this new world, CHROs play a critical role in successful transformation. In partnership with the CEO, function leaders, and business lines, CHROs can help build the right culture and capabilities required to successfully drive digital transformation across the enterprise.

Winning in digital is no easy feat. I recently coauthored, “Bringing Your Digital Strategy to Life,” at the request of CEOs. As you partner with your own CEO on your company’s digital imperatives, I hope you find this whitepaper to be a valuable resource.

Additionally, we’d love to open the dialogue and hear from you! What has been the most impactful way that you’ve accelerated transformation? We invite you to share your thoughts in the comments with #Run2Digital.

]]>https://www.ssaandco.com/accelerating-digital-transformation-5-ways-chros-can-help/feed/0Run, Don’t Walk, To Digital Transformationhttps://www.ssaandco.com/run-dont-walk-to-digital-transformation/
https://www.ssaandco.com/run-dont-walk-to-digital-transformation/#respondMon, 14 May 2018 20:13:10 +0000https://www.ssaandco.com/?p=8755Established companies looking to transform their business must go “all in” and start generating results quickly. This startup mindset is what incumbents compete against and it often poses a variety of challenges. Winning in digital does not come from slowly tweaking the margins of your business. It requires going beyond digital marketing to a holistic rethink of how your business model and enterprise can be enhanced through digital tools and technologies. And most importantly, leaders must shift from talk to walk—moving from strategies to action. Bringing strategies to life is where companies often get stuck. Even the best of strategies are just words on paper if they can’t be operationalized. These failures, combined with competitors’ successes and pressures from digital insurgents, widen the digital divide. Despite these challenges, we are seeing emerging best practices that shed new light for incumbents…

Established companies looking to transform their business must go “all in” and start generating results quickly. This startup mindset is what incumbents compete against and it often poses a variety of challenges. Winning in digital does not come from slowly tweaking the margins of your business. It requires going beyond digital marketing to a holistic rethink of how your business model and enterprise can be enhanced through digital tools and technologies. And most importantly, leaders must shift from talk to walk—moving from strategies to action.

Bringing strategies to life is where companies often get stuck. Even the best of strategies are just words on paper if they can’t be operationalized. These failures, combined with competitors’ successes and pressures from digital insurgents, widen the digital divide.

Despite these challenges, we are seeing emerging best practices that shed new light for incumbents trying to transform their business models. In partnership with a few of my colleagues at SSA & Company, we codified these insights into a simple, three-pronged philosophy.

So, what does it take for leaders of established companies to win in the digital world?

Key questions to ask:

Have you benchmarked the external landscape of successful digital companies within and outside your industry?

Does your company have a mechanism in place to continuously seek and spot the ‘next big thing’?

2. Inside-Out: Define How Digital Can Drive Your Business. Consider how digital capabilities propel or constrain your business strategies. Define your points of competitive advantage in the digital world. Then, augment your business strategies with digital models and capabilities. When SSA & Company works with clients looking for a deeper dive on, we apply our proprietary Digital Maturity Index (DMI)TM tool. DMI analyzes over 40 different digital capabilities across core dimensions, such as organizational alignment, customer engagement, product innovation, and operations. The relative importance of each dimension varies by industry and company. We find a consistent need across industries and companies for leaders to align the organization around the digital strategy, develop plans to operationalize them in market, and then prioritize initiatives to deliver best and fastest results. In prioritizing the work, many organizations struggle to understand the relative ROI of digital investments. Leaders must be able to examine the quantitative and qualitative tradeoffs in order to maximize ROI from each investment.

Do you have sufficient strategies to guide your work and do you have focused action plans to bring these strategies to life in market?

Do you have an effective mechanism to prioritize and sequence your digital initiatives for maximal returns?

3. Culture and Capabilities: Build the Mindset, Talent, and Capabilities to Embrace Transformation. Culture and capabilities are core to any business transformation. Building an agile culture and keeping pace with fast-changing digital capabilities define success in our increasingly digital world. Leaders must focus on building the right culture and capabilities to activate their company’s digital ambitions. Legacy thinkers using legacy frameworks in legacy cultures will fail. Generic digital approaches may get you in the game but will not build competitive advantage. Digitally-enabled programs, customized to your company’s culture, will help drive your strategic plan and bring it to life with excellent execution. Successful leaders align teams, change mindsets, and build skills and competencies required to maintain momentum and grow in a fast-moving and ever-changing marketplace.

Key Questions to ask:

Are you building an agile and data-driven culture?

Can your leaders across the organization clearly define and measure success on digital initiatives?

What is the current state of your leadership and organizational digital capability? How does your capability compare to that of best-in-class digital capabilities?

Successful digital transformations are rooted in bringing the outside in, getting the inside out, and building the right culture and capabilities to best compete in our increasingly digital world.

What ideas, lessons, and success stories do you have for accelerating business transformation through digital? Get the conversation going by sharing your thoughts with #Run2Digital

]]>https://www.ssaandco.com/run-dont-walk-to-digital-transformation/feed/0SSA & Company Notebook | Spring 2018https://www.ssaandco.com/ssa-company-notebook-spring-2018/
https://www.ssaandco.com/ssa-company-notebook-spring-2018/#respondThu, 05 Apr 2018 09:00:08 +0000https://www.ssaandco.com/?p=8715A note from our President: Experts have dubbed 2018 as the “year of data.” Artificial intelligence and machine learning shifted from emerging technologies to expected touchpoint for many companies, and most CEOs and executives have blockchain on their minds. Amid this changing technology landscape, a company’s success continues to stem from its ability to bring its strategy to life. This notebook issue is dedicated to the new tools and techniques that help get companies there. As always, we feature a special section on executive leadership and talent from Stephen Miles, founder and CEO of TMG. I am pleased to share these stories and practical insights with you. – David Niles Ideas That Made Us Think Sprint to Digital Transformation “Many companies start off thinking about digital transformation as a means of cutting costs,” shares Sprint Chief Digital Officer, Rob…

Experts have dubbed 2018 as the “year of data.” Artificial intelligence and machine learning shifted from emerging technologies to expected touchpoint for many companies, and most CEOs and executives have blockchain on their minds. Amid this changing technology landscape, a company’s success continues to stem from its ability to bring its strategy to life. This notebook issue is dedicated to the new tools and techniques that help get companies there.

As always, we feature a special section on executive leadership and talent from Stephen Miles, founder and CEO of TMG. I am pleased to share these stories and practical insights with you.

– David Niles

Ideas That Made Us Think

Sprint to Digital Transformation

“Many companies start off thinking about digital transformation as a means of cutting costs,” shares Sprint Chief Digital Officer, Rob Roy. Companies undergoing successful digital transformation understand their journey is a larger, more holistic undertaking. Sprint’s focus on reshaping its internal organization, building new capabilities, and implementing a digitally-centric change across processes and culture helped propel its rapid progress. For example, Sprint reorganized its product management team, adding AI experts to ensure a data-driven approach to building customer experiences. The company also built a digital adoption team that keeps everyone focused on “what’s next” in technologies. Sprint’s journey mirrors numerous legacy companies who seek to win the business of today and the business of tomorrow. SSA & Company recently released a digital transformation guide for CEOs to thrive in today’s world of constant and unprecedented disruption.

How Companies Can Thrive in the Battle for AI Talent

With the battle for AI supremacy underway, companies have deployed sky-high salaries as their current choice of weapon to recruit and retain AI talent. With a scarce talent pool of AI experts, companies must evaluate whether to hire an in-house AI team and system or rely on outside experts. Given the ever-increasing salaries and dearth of talent in this rapidly changing discipline, some pundits suggest that governments and universities should fund undergraduate and graduate programs so talent supply can meet companies’ demands. Should these recommendations come to fruition, internal AI training programs and steep salaries from tech giants will no longer be enough to retain the innovators of the future; rather, companies will need to strategically align AI to their operating strategy and set the framework for success, providing a purpose to attract tomorrow’s AI superstars.

Look to Digital Leaders for Inspiration, Not a Roadmap

Post-World War II, Japan’s industrials’ leaders tapped W. Edwards Deming’s teachings to become a global manufacturing leader. Companies implemented a management system that empowered factory-floor workers and stressed the importance of continuously fixing problems to boost production quality, leading to Japan’s success. However, even the best management system can fail unless uniquely tailored and actively managed. For example, continuous improvement cannot work if management becomes out of touch with the front line. As businesses converge and transform around digital, many will be tempted to simply replicate the approach of digital leaders. But there is no panacea. When optimizing any system, companies must design and execute properly against their own business goals and culture. Successful leaders and companies must understand customers, build and cascade the right KPIs, resource properly, and actively manage processes within the context of their business.

The Pathway to Reach the Digital Gold Standard

Fintech’s rise has redefined the financial services landscape. Digital pure plays like SoFi and Oscar have successfully addressed the widening gap between older and younger customers’ needs. Consequently, many legacy companies have either built new, expensive divisions or acquired fintech startups. Yet an old approach appears to have newfound helium. Radius Bank has improved decision-making and better-served customers by partnering with numerous fintech firms to collect more data on customers’ banking behaviors. Fintech startup AutoGravity recently announced partnerships with US Bank and TD Auto Finance to offer customers a quicker, more seamless car loan process. Strategically developing new partnerships between startups and incumbents let both parties reap internal operations and external marketplace benefits. The incumbent receives exposure to new innovation, and the partner receives significantly expanded distribution.

Building a Pilot and Experimental Culture

Blockchain’s meteoric rise has created a fervor in many executive suites and boardrooms. Fearing obsolescence or missing out, major financial institutions, health, food safety, and other companies launched scores of pilots. L.L. Bean announced, and then canceled, plans to sew flexible sensors into products to collect data on wear frequency, outside temperature, and more. While blockchain is extremely disruptive, too many companies view it as an entirely new strategy and invest in it as such, forcing significant rework and opportunity loss. At its core, blockchain simply provides information provenance and helps decentralize trust. Successful leaders and companies endeavor to best understand their business and then tap the right tools to propel it, fueling a culture of measured experimentation. Over-rotating on disruptive technologies without tying them into overall business strategy is no better than ignoring them completely.

10 Talent Management Mistakes CEOs Can’t Afford to Make in 2018

With many industries constantly shifting their business models and goals to evolve with the digital revolution, companies must avoid certain mistakes while managing talent. “Boards and investors are pressuring CEOs not only to set the right tone at the top, but also to make sure talent throughout the organization is completely aligned both in performance goals and in cultural fit. But many companies, if they are not already in the middle of one, are on the brink of a talent failure–and they might not see the mistakes that got them there,” shares Stephen Miles.

The full article discusses the talent management mistakes CEOs can’t afford to make in detail.

]]>https://www.ssaandco.com/ssa-company-notebook-spring-2018/feed/0SSA & Company Notebook | Fall 2017https://www.ssaandco.com/notebook-fall-2017/
https://www.ssaandco.com/notebook-fall-2017/#respondWed, 20 Dec 2017 18:59:56 +0000https://www.ssaandco.com/?p=8673A note from our President: As Chairman of Columbia Business School’s Deming Center Advisory Board, I had the distinct pleasure to award this year’s Deming Cup to Jeffrey Immelt, former Chairman and CEO of GE, and Arne Sorenson, President and CEO of Marriott International. The Deming Cup recognizes leaders who make significant contributions and develop continuous improvement within their organizations. In today’s business environment, operationalizing strategy matters more than ever. The Deming Center’s mission is to ensure that the operations skills, quality expertise, and leadership are made modern. At SSA & Company, we take these central tenants and build further upon them. This quarter’s newsletter focuses on topics surrounding continuous excellence in an environment of consistent change and uncertainty. I am pleased to share these stories and practical insights with you. – David Niles Ideas That Made Us Think…

As Chairman of Columbia Business School’s Deming Center Advisory Board, I had the distinct pleasure to award this year’s Deming Cup to Jeffrey Immelt, former Chairman and CEO of GE, and Arne Sorenson, President and CEO of Marriott International. The Deming Cup recognizes leaders who make significant contributions and develop continuous improvement within their organizations.

In today’s business environment, operationalizing strategy matters more than ever. The Deming Center’s mission is to ensure that the operations skills, quality expertise, and leadership are made modern. At SSA & Company, we take these central tenants and build further upon them. This quarter’s newsletter focuses on topics surrounding continuous excellence in an environment of consistent change and uncertainty.

I am pleased to share these stories and practical insights with you.

– David Niles

Ideas That Made Us Think

How to Create an “A” System Rather Than Just Searching for “A” Players”

This year’s Deming Cup Award winners, Jeffrey Immelt and Arne Sorenson, guided their businesses with operational skills, quality expertise, and leadership excellence. W. Edwards Deming’s impact on contemporary business is well documented. He was one of the first to develop and implement a management system as a corporate strategy. With this system, Deming formed bridges between operational excellence, winning in the marketplace, achieving lasting corporate success, and macroeconomic impact. In today’s constantly changing business environment, leaders must channel Deming once again to create value in their organizations by striving for an “A” system that generates alignment. The system then enables executives to punch above their weight and allows an organization to outperform the sum of its parts.

Artificial Intelligence Can Propel Operations When Blended into Human Workforce

Even the most seemingly impervious industries and departments must evaluate how to best build and leverage a blended workforce. At Stitch Fix, an online shopping subscription company, the creative process starts with AI. A data science team working with designers analyzes the company’s order data to predict clothes customers will want to wear. These teams also use insights to identify gaps in the company’s inventory. But its human designers still evaluate seasonal trends and picks, feeding information to the software. Amazon also recently developed its own algorithm that scans social media and gleans insights for fashion trends to inform its garment production. Workforces powered by analytics and augmented with AI, not only gain efficiencies, but also a competitive edge.

What to Know About the Supply Chain of Tomorrow

With U.S. e-commerce sales hitting $390 billion in 2016, double the amount of five years ago, and continued pressure to ship faster, manufacturers and shipping warehouses continue exploring automation options to meet and exceed benchmarks while simultaneously cutting costs. Automation is close to overcoming retailers’ toughest hurdle—teaching a machine to pick up a variety of items and put them in a box. With human-picking being warehouses’ biggest labor cost, companies have built for this specific robotic automation revolution and have worked to accelerate the potential breakthrough by making their research public. Once finalized, these machines have the potential to work 50% faster than humans and can run 24 hours a day. As the pace of technology disruptions increases, leaders need to build capabilities to continuously understand use cases for their business, evaluate how automation and new tools can be operationalized, and assess the ROI—given price inflections, their specific products, and implementation costs. It’s not a one-size-fits-all approach. The future “lights out” warehouse doesn’t happen with a switch flip. Companies need to understand when and how to start going dark.

How Healthcare Payers Can Thrive in the Evolving Landscape

Today’s economy and political climate suggest that profiting from risk pooling is no longer viable, and health insurance will evolve into a third-party administrator of value-based claims processing. States are stepping up with respect to healthcare policy and financing with an increasing number of waiver requests of Health and Human Services. Consequently, federal, state, and/or private payers will pursue self-funded plans. SSA & Company’s benchmarking and scenario-based planning study evaluated 2015 CMS MLR data on nearly 200 payers and found that the payers best prepared for this shift have substantial scale, a substantive book of business in self-funded plans, and exhibit low SG&A costs. Payers can reduce complexities, decrease costs, and facilitate the transition to value-based reimbursement by modernizing their technology platforms, deploying process automation, and becoming more effective in using data analytics. But companies must strategically integrate new technology and analytics and streamline operations for its full effect.

How Data and Analytics-Savvy CFOs Stay Ahead of the Game

As businesses seek to transform digitally, job descriptions and responsibilities continue to evolve. A dramatic shift is the CFO position, which now must focus on top- and bottom-line growth as well as oversee several new functional areas. SSA & Company’s John Rodgers and Nick Kramer share that CFOs can “identify, measure, and view non-financial performance indicators that predict financial performance,” and, “apply analytics to strategic KPIs to grow business.” CFOs who assume a larger role in their company’s overall transformation, “find ways to effectively make use of new analytics and digital tools will drive stronger performance, create efficiencies, and steer their company’s innovation.”

Tapping Social Media Data to Unlock Digital and Operations Transformation

Many companies overlook and underutilize their social media data as a vehicle to improve operations and results. Today’s digital landscape demands that businesses liberate social media’s treasure trove of actionable data from the marketing silo and bring it to other business functions. Nissan’s teams scan structured and unstructured social media data to understand sentiment, volume, and influence of consumers. The team uses collected and analyzed data to validate and resolve consumer satisfaction and problems. One measure of a successful, consumer-centric, digital transformation occurs when companies eviscerate organizational silos and push for a larger initiative with all available unstructured data. Combining social media data with current analytics initiatives and operations data enhances products, advertising, and customer experience—improving top and bottom line growth.

Blockchain Can Prevent Your Next Supply Chain Disaster

Blockchain is not just fueling a hot-trading currency. Organizations can utilize the data-fed technology to mediate trust and promote transparency with their supply chain and procurement relationships. The technology enables tracing permissions and activity logs to identify where the contamination originated. By automatically logging each procurement and supply chain transaction into an encrypted ledger, there will be less room for data-input errors, which could then alleviate bottlenecks or issues that might occur further down the production line. Adopting blockchain into your procurement process and supply chain is a net-efficiency gain that can streamline operations, reduce errors, and rapidly increase your response time and accountability.

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